Australian rider Rohan Dennis has been crowned as the new champion of the individual time trial at the World Championships of Innsbruck.

Dennis showed great domination at the day's main event of the World Championships by beating last year's winner Tom Dumoulin and European ITT champion Victor Campenaerts by one minute and 21 seconds. "It's a dream come true to be World Champion," said the rider at the finish line. "I've been chasing this since I was a junior, I've never won it in any age group, so to win my first one in seniors is really special.

"It's an amazing feeling. There's a lot of people I have to thank and the first person is my wife. She's back home and I'm sure she is pretty happy at the moment. Now, I'm just going to enjoy the moment and enjoy the next year in the rainbow jersey and try again next year."

Dennis was the penultimate rider to start the competition and crossed the finish line just ahead of Dumoulin. "I was being coached from the car by Brad McGee and he gave me confidence at the top of the climb once Dumoulin came through and I was one minute up, and he just kept me calm. I was considering a bit of a victory salute but I wanted to make sure as you are never sure until Tom crosses the line.

"I knew the power that we rode in the team time trial. We lost 19 seconds and I held higher power up the hill than I did in the team time trial. I knew that Tom rode the front of the team time trial and he was pushing pretty hard so I had a fairly good idea of what power I needed to hold. I think I was 35 seconds in front at the bottom and when I got to the top I was fairly confident that I had at least done the same time as him."